I’m down in DC in a hotel, and there are a lot of folks staying here who are in town for the AIPAC conference. Bernie Sanders didn’t show up. He was the only remaining presidential candidate to blow it off, although he did make a video for the internets.
His message was a bit different than Clinton’s.
A week after Israel appropriated huge tracts of land in the occupied West Bank, Sanders joined the United Nations and the European Union in criticizing Israel’s expansion of settlements, saying it “undermines the peace process” and Israeli “security.”
“It is absurd for elements within the Netanyahu government to suggest that building more settlements in the West Bank is the appropriate response to the most recent violence. It is also not acceptable that the Netanyahu government decided to withhold hundreds of millions of Shekels in tax revenue from the Palestinians, which it is supposed to collect on their behalf,” Sanders said.
The Vermont senator also called for an end to the economic blockade of Gaza and a “sustainable and equitable distribution of precious water resources so that Israel and Palestine can both thrive as neighbors.”“Peace has to mean security for every Israeli from violence and terrorism. But peace also means security for every Palestinian. It means achieving self-determination, civil rights and economic well-being for the Palestinian people,” said Sanders.
“Peace will mean ending what amounts to the occupation of Palestinian territory, establishing mutually agreed upon borders, and pulling back settlements in the West Bank, just as Israel did in Gaza – once considered an unthinkable move on Israel’s part,” he added.
In contrast, Hillary Clinton attended the AIPAC conference and praised the “deep emotional connection” the U.S. shares with Israel.
The Democrat front-runner made it clear she would not remain neutral in the Israel-Palestine conflict and would invite Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the U.S. as one of her first moves in the White House.
Clinton also criticized the growing Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, telling Netanyahu: “Don’t let anyone bully you, or shut down debate … especially in places of learning like college or universities.”
It’s interesting that the only Jewish candidate in the race is the one taking the most critical and standoffish positions vis-a-vis Israel. I suppose he’s partially inoculated against charges of anti-semitism which frees him up a bit, but he’s basically taking the mainstream progressive posture toward Netanyahu’s right-wing government.
Clinton’s position is that she’s not allowing any daylight between the U.S. and Israel, and that means that we won’t hear anything critical of Netanyahu on the campaign trail.
Given the conditions in the Middle East, especially in Syria, and the current leadership vacuum on the Palestinian side, and the periodic ISIS-sponsored terror attacks in the West, I think Clinton is taking the shrewder political position here. That doesn’t mean I like it. But the same old progressive critique of Israel is beginning to look a bit torn and frayed as both the Arabs and Israelis have changed the facts on the ground in the region.
I mean, can you really look at Libya and Iraq and Syria, and the Palestinian political landscape, and the leadership of Egypt and Turkey and Saudi Arabia and the Emirates, and see in that some ripeness for the idea of a Palestinian State?
There’s a regional war of religion going on which seems to be sucking up most of the attention at the moment. I mean, the refugee crisis and the behavior of Islamic State are higher priorities on everyone’s agenda than trying to reanimate Abu Mazen.
Still, Sanders’ decision to campaign among the Mormons rather than attend AIPAC is a strong statement of disapproval toward Netanyahu’s government, and it’s certainly preferable to engaging in a panderfest.
re: AZ primary – Maricopa County, 60 polls for 1.25 million voters. Nick Petrovich
Remi Kanazi
iirc Democrats were furious in 2000 and 2004 when voters in FL and OH had to stand in line for hours to vote. Tonight, only some Democrats are furious about what voters had to go through in AZ.
This kind of thing is getting ridiculous. I hope that the Sanders kids know that their only hope to is to get involved on a massive yet local level. This fish is rotten from the head on down, but there is no saving the head without first regenerating the body.
Getting ridiculous? At this point, nothing short of a constitutional voting rights amendment will correct the abuses of disenfranchisement, cruel and unusual voting restrictions and requirements, and not properly counting the ballots.
As a Jewish-American, this issue is personal and painful. Looking at the coalitions that define the debate, I see Israel as throwing it’s entire lot in with the US GOP, and living off the love of the Christian Right. No Jew with any sense of morality wants to be on the side of such low-lifes. It assures that Israel will be less able to work with Democratic presidents, unless they are Clintonian neocons.
With this dynamic, Israel’s fortunes are tied to that of the GOP. This I cannot abide. I appreciate that Sanders understands that Palestinians are actual human beings. This is a fact that it seems is easy for the Likud, the GOP, and sadly, many American Jews to grasp.
It all comes to down to compassion. When you start picking and choosing who deserves compassion, eventually you will be the one to suffer. That sounds like some quote from the Buddha, but I actually just came up with it. How wise and compassionate of me.
It seems that Netanyahu is playing with his country’s survival to further his own political agenda and/or philosophy.
He doesn’t see it that way. He sees a “greater Israel” as the way to make it stronger. Sort of like a certain national leader that made his country larger and “purer” to survive for hundreds of years.
Totally.
I meant “to forget” not “to grasp”
Probably is obvious but just for the record.
I’ve been holding my nose and supporting Hillary’s campaign until now, but her AIPAC pander goes too far. It drives home the sheer cynicism of the woman. I don’t believe she’s learned a thing following her Iraq vote and I don’t think she has an idealistic bone in her body. The Democratic caucus comes to Washington on Saturday and I’ll be supporting Sanders.
Of course if Hillary prevails nationally, I’ll support her over Trump or Cruz or whatever monster the R’s put up. But, heavens, what a craven, dishonest person she is.
Naked capitalism had a thread the other day on Hillary’s Possible intention to realign the Dems with neocons and scoop the pool of mega-donors for all time. This AIPAC obscenity could be a move on that design.
A remnant Republican party left with poor whites and a splintered left would leave DLC Dems in the catbird seat until it all exploded under their asses.
Given the conditions in the Middle East, especially in Syria, and the current leadership vacuum on the Palestinian side, and the periodic ISIS-sponsored terror attacks in the West, I think Clinton is taking the shrewder political position here. That doesn’t mean I like it. But the same old progressive critique of Israel is beginning to look a bit torn and frayed as both the Arabs and Israelis have changed the facts on the ground in the region.
I mean, can you really look at Libya and Iraq and Syria, and the Palestinian political landscape, and the leadership of Egypt and Turkey and Saudi Arabia and the Emirates, and see in that some ripeness for the idea of a Palestinian State?
Unbelievable how stupid these remarks … is this DNC politically correct? Have You become part of establishment.
Bernie Sanders lived the kibbutz ideals, he lived on the original concept to establish the “UN made” State of Israel which was meant to live next to its Palestinian neighbours, in the independent state of Palestine. A number of countries have recognized the Palestinian statehood. It’s part of International Law, you Americans are confounded by what is right and what is politically astute today without a vision what would be the long-term consequences.
Part of the oxygen feeding the beast of Al Qaeda (Osama Bin Laden) and the Islamic State and most terror attacks like the one at Fort Hood was the suppression of the Palestinians by the Israelis and the grievance towards Jews and the city of all faiths Jerusalem.
Your statement smells and could have been written by an original Neocon.
I have been quite clear what I think of HRC and her foreign policy stance… one of multiple diaries on this topic:
○ Learning Curve of the Clinton Dynasty, 8 Year Drought for Palestinians
○ Former Israeli Diplomat Urges US Pressure for Peace with Palestinians
HRC would NOT be a third term Barack Obama … she is much closer to the Republican Middle East policy under George Bush. Kissinger, Bzrezinski, Albright … wtf.
“I mean, can you really look at Libya and Iraq and Syria, and the Palestinian political landscape, and the leadership of Egypt and Turkey and Saudi Arabia and the Emirates, and see in that some ripeness for the idea of a Palestinian State?”
As if one could say with a straight face that Israeli finger prints are not all over the current instability and suffering in the ME. Starting with enabling GWB.
Maybe they think they can export their Palestinians to broken Syria?
oui, this conclusion by BooMan argues against your “DLC” claim here:
“Still, Sanders’ decision to campaign among the Mormons rather than attend AIPAC is a strong statement of disapproval toward Netanyahu’s government, and it’s certainly preferable to engaging in a panderfest.”
It is inferred by the relentless attacks on Israeli policy that if they, the U.S., Russia and others were not meddling, Middle Eastern culture and government actions would be functioning well right now. We can choose to take a less condescending view which holds everyone responsible for their actions, including Arabs and Persians. Few are good actors in this long, disappointing story.
Ever!
Yes, the first thing I thought of was that Neocon phrase from 2003, The road to Jerusalem runs through Baghdad. Or whatever it was exactly.
The point is the same – we can’t do anything about Israel and Palestine till we sort out everything else in the Middle East, which is getting it backwards. Palestine is the visceral issue in the Middle East and beyond, and failing to resolve it – in fact enabling Israel to make it worse – ensures we will face continuing and escalating chaos and hostility.
Saying we can’t do Palestine till we do everything else simply comes down to saying we don’t want to have to confront Israel.
○ AIPAC Apologizes for Donald Trump’s Attack on President Obama | JTA |
[Links added are mine – Oui]
So one of Clinton’s first moves in the White House would be to invite Netanyahu to the U.S.? The GOP-orchestrated end-run around Obama wasn’t good enough for him (or for Clinton)?
Another Bona Fide reason to vote for, and continue financially — along with donating time for — Bernie Sanders.
Netanyahu is going to learn the adage “You reap what you sow” sooner or later, if he hasn’t learned it privately already.
He definitely has not. It’s all Obama’s fault, by definition.
Oh so now it’s politically astute to throw our lot in with Israeli fascists. As if it wasn’t before? Hillary Clinton has every advantage in the world. And yet she still went there to show what a hawk she is.
No, Booman, this has nothing to do with being “politically astute”. Hillary Clinton is a chameleon, but at AIPAC she revealed what she truly is: a warmongering piece of shit. You know this. You’ve held your tongue. I remember your 2008 posts on Clinton, and you know as well as I do that she’s the same as she was then.
The “facts” on the ground wouldn’t exist without US funding and protection.
Still, Palestinian activists have long known about these changing “facts on the ground”, which is why they have called for a one-state solution. Sanders is still not brave enough to say what everyone already knows, which is that there is no hope for a Palestinian state — even the Israeli Labor Party has given up on it because Israel continues its tack to the right, and they must remain politically viable.
Gideon Levy and Max Blumenthal had a talk about Israel’s future and American involvement in that future. Gideon Levy: Americans “Are Supporting the First Signs of Fascism in Israel”
Very powerful.
[Links added are mine – Oui]
I think these things needed to be said to AIPAC. Sanders should have gone to AIPAC and said them. Refusing to do that for specious reasons and then sharing the planned text so that Mondoweiss can go to town is significantly worse than doing nothing. Enormously counterproductive, but hey, he wins credibility among real Clinton haters, an unhelpfully small portion of the Democratic Party base.
I agree that Clinton’s address was bad, but what Bernie did here hurts his ability to win future primaries and hurts his ability to influence those inside and outside AIPAC’s orbit. It also wasted an opportunity to influence Israel’s behavior.
Sanders tried to video in. Just like Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney were allowed to do in 2012. He was refused. Hmm, i wonder why. Blaming Sanders for this is bullshit.
Chill. In the long run (like a day or two) it wouldn’t have made any difference.
I think he did fine.
Perhaps you’re right. I know I’m not thinking about what happened at the AIPAC conference when I get in the voting booth, and I expect the vast majority of Democrats share that view.
new corrida
El Quemazon
It sounds as though the hotel in DC is serving up a lot of free kool aid.
Appreciate your brief review of countries in the region. And these atavistic basket-case political-military regimes are what Israel needs 3 to 5 billion a year to defend itself against? Not likely–the annexation, ethnic cleansing, and settlement/land theft will cross the river and continue, and Hillary can oversee that if she likes.
A disaster of a speech, a disaster of a candidate, and one more disaster-in-the-making for the country. To quote one of the large banners at W’s inauguration: GOD HELP US
So the guy who made it a point to take a series of massive shits on Obama, that’s the guy Hilary wants to have a BFF sleepover with first thing? Hmmmm.
I sense Hilary’s deep, lingering, slightly gropy embrace of Bibi is something less than authentic, but that doesn’t exactly make it better.
It seems we are seeing the normalization of permanent apartheid and gradual ethnic cleansing of Palestinian areas, along with an elite transition away from even mentioning the (long dead, shambolic) peace process.
Honestly, Israel is perhaps not the worst of the US “allies” in the region, but it galls to send them $3 Billion a year so they can buy weapons from our arms industry so they can violently oppress Palestinians. What a wonderful triangle! They can well afford those weapons themselves. That’s like subsidizing Saudi Arabia’s beheading swords. And arguing that this policy has value because “facts on the ground” have changed? I’m unsure how giving extremists a permanent and valid grievance is helpful. I suspect Obama would disagree with that as well.
Fucking really, Booman?
Can’t trust those arabs. Apartheid forever!
Don’t the American people know that Israelis have universal health care, the kind they can’t have in the their own country because its socialist. Obama refused to give it, Clinton has no idea what its about. Sanders is maybe the only one who knows because he would have been well cared for on the kibbutz where he stayed.
Nor does it occur to Americans that by sending so much money to Israeli the US government is indirectly subsidizing Israeli health care, the kind Americans are not allowed to have because of rabid ideologues and market fakes. The money from the US gives the Israeli government financial leverage to maintain the system, otherwise money spent on it would very likely be diverted to arms and necessary expenses to the financial and health-care detriment of Israelis. I call that an indirect subsidy.
American has flubbed it completely. And then along came Trump …
What does it matter, since you say that it is mathematically impossible for Bernie to win? The example might change Hillary’s mind by appealing to her sense of decency? Thanks! I needed the laugh.
That’s an interesting question. I started to try to answer it, but found my answer getting too long for this format.
I guess I could sum it up by saying that nearly all the countries in the region, in my view, are conducting a policy of destabilization designed to continue the status quo, which leads nowhere. In reality, it doesn’t even continue the status quo, it’s basically entire countries acting like suicide bombers in slow motion.
I will repeat something I’ve said a number of times in my comments: Contrary to what many still believe, Saudi Arabia and Israel are allies.
None of these players want a Palestinian State, and if one were created, they would be constantly working to undermine it, as they are constantly working to undermine even the possibility of such a state.
The only exception is Iran, but that means that anything leading to stability is to Iran’s advantage. A Palestinian State would inevitably fall within their sphere of influence. Whether this would be good or bad for the US really depends on our relations with Iran.
The paranoia against Iran reminds me of the Cold War, except that it is considerably less rational.
Would just add Egypt to that group of SA and Israel.
Agreed.
Yeah, I heard HRC’s fawning suck up to AIPAC and Nuttyahoo. Color me utterly unsurprised. This can be Exhibit A for one of the many – but one of the more important – reasons why I loathe la Clinton.
Clinton is a War Hawk’s war Hawk. She’s a rightwinger’s wet dream of a candidate. She’s the fair haired gal of the MIC, BigSpy & Wall Street.
In a different world, she’d be running as the candidate for the GOP. That the GOP professes to hate her and view her as ‘liberal’ is just bs.
But there you have it. Sadly, though, the average US citizen is largely unaware of AIPAC and what it means and what Clinton’s slavish devotion to Israel means for us personally.
Of course, Sanders sets the right tone, and yeah, he happens to be Jewish. Some Jews do see what a horror show Israel has become, and they don’t agree with it.
I live in CA, so I won’t have to cast a ballot for Clinton even if the race comes down to HRC v the odious Trump (or even more odious Cruz). I’ll either not vote for POTUS or vote for Jill Stein. That’s just the way it is. I cannot, in all good conscience, vote for this pandering War Hawk, for whom no amount of money is ever enough. Our very own Marie Antoinette. Let them eat cake, eh Hillary? You turn coat.
Being Jewish does not insulate one from being called anti-Semitic. I speak from experience. It would take several volumes to write about this. In any case, many American Jews are disgusted by Netanyahu and his ilk. They’re not the people attending AIPAC. More likely they’re unaffiliated with organized Judaism because they see no place there for their political perspectives.
I hear you, man. I am affiliated, but I avoid politics like the plague. I don’t assume anybody there agrees with me, and that’s probably not far off. In many congregations I’m sure it’s almost impossible. Not good for religion to be so politicized.
I’m starting to think that ALL religion is politicized.
I’m kind of like Bernie Sanders in that I don’t talk about religion much. (Hey, we come from the same neighborhood.)
But anyway, there’s an essential level at which religion is a purely personal experience. And when people participate in those rituals together, it’s communal, and that part still works too. Maybe it’s because it was formed gradually over the course of countless generations.
After that is where the trouble starts. Still, it’s comforting to know that the “after that” is not the heart of it, even if some people seem to be confused on that score. But it is a royal pain in the ass.
We all have different worries about the situation we are in now… mine is that eight years of a Clinton presidency will leave the Democratic party radioactive again.
Maybe that’s 20 years of Clinton fatigue speaking. But the worst effect of the last Clinton presidency was the election of George W Bush because he was a such a nice, decent guy and everyone wanted to drink a beer with him.
Eight years is so long that it doesn’t seem to figure in people’s thinking. If the Democratic party were in it for the long haul, though, every election would also be about building the party.
I am becoming convinced that more and more people are thinking with their limbic brain these days under the threat of climate change that they desperately want to ignore.
I’m not so sure she’ll get 8 if she gets in at all. I’d be surprised if we go for more than 12 years with the same party in control of the White House–but then I wasn’t around for FDR/Truman, so I have no frame of reference.